Living in rural farm country where most of us women even at the age of 60+, are single & own our own farm with all the animals (horses, cows, chickens)......we are ALL busy & we all don't have time to just chat on the phone with each other. We get together at least once a month & someone's house for a pot luck lunch & we do plan activities.

However I am involved with many different groups & we are ALL friends but we are all very busy with the demands that life has & we all understand each other because we all have common lives. I was sort of the go to person to get out emails to let everyone know what is going on until the company that provides my email server upgraded it & broke it so it doesn't work on my computer so I have extra work to set up a new email system that does work on my computer.....more work that I need time to focus on & since I'm the techie of the group (was a computer design engineer for 15 years), I'm usually the one that gets to do the techie stuff in all of my groups that I am involved with.

I am involved in several different horse groups & different volunteer groups & I am involved with my church & I have another wonderful group of friends from a previous Bible study group that we do take the time to chat because we live several towns apart.

My daughter will only text because she hates talking on the phone so my communication with her is totally via texting & I don't mind. I would rather communicate in the way that she prefers than to demand that she call & talk to me & then NEVER communicate with her.

I have found that flexibility is the only way that I can survive & get the things done that I need to get done. I wouldn't appreciate people calling me all the time just to talk because I really don't have the time to just chat except on rare occassions.

I work hard keeping my farm going & when I come in at night, I'm exhausted & I do good to make myself dinner, shower & fall into bed. The thing is that we are ALL in the same situation & with most of us not being married & not having money to hire work to be done, it usually falls all on us & it's a load of work that we all enjoy, but it is work that doesn't leave us a lot of time for socializing though we do find time to do a trail ride during the week for a couple of hours. We don't do our socializing on the phone. We usually call to arrange whatever it is we are planning on doing & then socialize while doing it.

I was on FB message with someone I knew from online & I was surprised at how much time I spend just chatting & it wasted time that I honestly didn't have that I needed to be spending working on my house. I can understand why people make themselves invisible when they are online. They have a right to set boundaries & only communicate when they truly have the time to do it. I hate sitting there communicating with someone while my brain is thinking of how many other things I really need to be doing that actually have a much higher priority in my life....& it's hard to break away from some people when they have nothing better to be doing & they have no reason to stop chatting & they won't even listen to you when you say you need to go. That is rude on their part also because they have no consideration for anyone else then themselves & their own life.